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Excellent recipe. The first time I made it, I ran out of semi-sweet and had to add 1/2 cu milk chocolate in order to reach the full 1 1/2 cups of chips. This ended up changing the consistency of it to more of a cake than a brownie, interestingly. The second time I did it the correct way (with all semi-sweet chips) and it was perfect.

As other reviewers reported, I had to bake the cake for more than twice as long as the recipe said (I pulled it out at 1 hr and 7 minutes, though it probably would've been better at 1 hr...). I turned the heat down to 325 and then 315, but the middle still wasn't cooking so I finally put it on a lower rack and put an empty pan on the upper rack in an attempt to get the middle cooked. Once it was done (and after I had pulled off the entire top layer, as it was quite overdone), it was the moist, light cake that others had said it would be. I think it's the right sweetness (others had said to reduce the sugar but I wouldn't change it!). I think next time I would start baking this at 325 or 315, on the lower rack with a pan covering it in an attempt to get the middle to be done sooner.

These were AMAZING! I brought them to a work function and my boss was still talking about them the next day.
I added 1 tsp of lemon zest to the shortbread bottom, added slightly more lemon juice than was called for (but less than 3/4 cup because I was afraid it would be too lemony given that I added zest) and added sliced almonds to the coconut topping. As another reviewer suggested, I didn't add the coconut/almond topping until the last 15 minutes of baking. Next time I would stick to the 1/2 cu lemon juice, but other than that would do it exactly the same. Thanks so much for this recipe!

I made this for a party and my friends loved it, however I gave it 4 stars because the cake part was so crumbly that I wasn't able to cut it into layers (so it was just two layers instead of 4). The cake mix I used called for just egg whites, so I think next time I would use whole eggs to make it hold together better. It was very well received, though!